American Eagle Flight 4127
Aerospatiale ATR-42-300 · Accident: airframe, component or system failure while standing
From an unrecorded airport to South Bend International Airport (SBN)
Event
- NTSB case
- CHI93FA129
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Completed
- API-reported fatalities
- 1 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- 1
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- Airline
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Aerospatiale ATR-42-300
- Aircraft type
- Aerospatiale ATR-42
- Category
- Airplane
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- N422MQ
- Operator
- American Eagle
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From not recordedTo South Bend International Airport (SBN), South Bend, IN
- Aircraft age
- Not recorded
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 121: Air Carrier
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- Standing · engine(s) operating
- First occurrenceThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Airframe, component or system failure
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Minor
Cause areas
- Company/operator management › Inadequate transition/upgrade training
- Unqualified person › Maintenance, service of aircraft/equipment, attempted
Approximate · Estimated position: the centre of Chicago, IL, the place the record names. Not the accident site.
NTSB narrative
THE CREW HAD AN ELECTRICAL FAULT INDICATION AS THEY STARTED THE LEFT ENGINE FOR A NIGHT DEPARTURE. THEY SHUT DOWN THE LEFT ENGINE TO BOARD A MAINTENANCE TROUBLESHOOTER. THE MECHANIC IDENTIFIED A FAILED PART AND OBTAINED ITS REPLACEMENT. THE FAILURE EXTINGUISHED THE AIRPLANE'S EXTERNAL LIGHTS AND PREVENTED ITS ACCEPTING EXTERNAL ELECTRICAL POWER. A BAGGAGE HANDLER FROM ANOTHER AIRLINE ARRIVED BEHIND THE AIRPLANE WITH BAGS FOR THE FLIGHT. THE CREW PREPARED TO SHUT DOWN THE RIGHT ENGINE TO ACCOMPLISH THE PART REPLACEMENT AND SIGNALLED THE MARSHALLER TO APPLY EXTERNAL POWER TO MAINTAIN LIGHT IN THE PASSENGER CABIN. THE MARSHALLER WAS AT THE EXTERNAL POWER RECEPTACLE ON THE FRONT RIGHT FUSELAGE WHEN THE HANDLER WALKED FORWARD ALONG THE RIGHT SIDE AND INTO THE TURNING PROPELLER. THE BAGGAGE HANDLER WAS ON HER SECOND DAY IN THAT CAPACITY AND ON NIGHT SHIFT. SHE HAD BEEN AN AIRCRAFT CLEANER ON DAYSHIFT FOR AN OPERATOR WHOSE FLEET IS ALL JET. THE JOB CHANGE ENTAILED NO CLASSROOM OR PRACTICAL TRAINING.
Probable cause
the unqualified baggage handler's attempting to load an unfamiliar airplane and inadequate training by the airline which employed the baggage handler.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record CHI93FA129
- Event ID
- 20001211X12079
- Case number
- CHI93FA129
- Dataset
- historical-pre2008
- Source SHA-256
- 89e2df6d848e7ab3b42e7d7c7a03ff403303057a26ca04c95b3ea67201c3ce74
Source notes (5)
- Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: local date, investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date; the NTSB stores the UTC date 1993-04-05.
- API snapshot SHA-256: efa3e175a4cca177f7d327fb81911d4b7c5338f4b4da9831c5421f6903f8cfda; retrieved 2026-09-18T18:39:36.261Z.
- The NTSB's operator name is blank for N422MQ; the operator shown is the name the NTSB records it doing business as.